dawn
noun
the first appearance of daylight in the morning.
dawn
1 American
[dawn]
/ dɔn /
noun
-
dawns
plural
verb (used without object)
-
dawns,
present (3rd person singular)
-
dawned,
past participle, past
-
dawning
present participle
Dawn
2
American
[dawn]
/ dɔn /
noun
dawn
British
/ dɔːn /
noun
-
daybreak; sunrise
-
the sky when light first appears in the morning
-
the beginning of something
verb
-
to begin to grow light after the night
-
to begin to develop, appear, or expand
-
to begin to become apparent (to)
dawn
Idioms
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
Inflected Forms
Nouns
Participles
Conjugated Forms
Present
-
dawnsimple
-
dawnssimple
-
have dawnedperfect
-
has dawnedperfect
-
am dawningprogressive
-
are dawningprogressive
-
is dawningprogressive
-
have been dawningperfect progressive
-
has been dawningperfect progressive
Past
-
dawnedsimple
-
had dawnedperfect
-
was dawningprogressive
-
were dawningprogressive
-
had been dawningperfect progressive
Future
Etymology
Origin of dawn
First recorded before 1150; Middle English dawen (verb), Old English dagian, derivative of dæg day; akin to Old Norse daga, Middle Dutch, Middle Low German dagen, Old High German tagēn
Explanation
The noun dawn refers to the first light of day, or the first time period, like the dawn of a new era, which occurs when a new president takes office. Not just the beginning of a day, the noun dawn can refer to any beginning, like the dawn of the Internet era. As a verb, dawn can mean "become light" or "become clear," like when it dawns on you that you left an important paper at home today. In that case, you can suddenly see what you did wrong, like at the dawn of a new day, when it is no longer dark and you can see, literally.
Vocabulary lists containing dawn
First-Name Basis: Words That Are Also Names
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Beowulf vocabulary
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Talk Like Shakespeare Day, List 2
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Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
See Examples For:
The dodo may have followed a more flexible daily schedule, with activity possibly extending into dawn and dusk.
From Science Daily ● Aug. 9, 2026
The traps are laid in the afternoon and picked up the following morning, allowing them to collect mosquitoes at dusk and dawn, when the insects are most active.
From Slate ● Aug. 4, 2026
Jaber Abed, 33, said he and his family had fled their tent next to the hospital at dawn.
From Barron's ● Aug. 1, 2026
As a new dawn begins for City in the Far East, Grealish will be watching on hoping the sun is not setting on his Blues career.
From BBC ● Jul. 29, 2026
Lady Constance lit up like the dawn to see her dear lady friend.
From "The Long-Lost Home" by Maryrose Wood
Prosecutor Dawn Pritchard read out a victim personal statement telling the judge the victim "feels numb when she thinks back to how she felt at the time".
From BBC ● Aug. 10, 2026
"It's been excellent having the coats," said Dawn Prosser, manager of the Swindon night shelter.
From BBC ● Aug. 5, 2026
Making those decisions wasn’t difficult as concerns grew over a cyclosporiasis outbreak that has sickened thousands nationwide, according to Dawn Brand Fluhler, the restaurant’s general manager.
From MarketWatch ● Jul. 18, 2026
Our travel columnist Dawn Gilbertson tested the newest Miami outpost of PS, a private luxury terminal.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jul. 15, 2026
There is not much of the trip left, and so Dawn Celeste and Luke Messenger are now trekking alongside Grandpa Ed and Annabelle to the end.
From "A Heart in a Body in the World" by Deb Caletti
It dawns on him that he’s in a new, bizarre, just-for-him reality, and he won’t see daylight until he can spot the anomalies in each go-round.
From Los Angeles Times ● Apr. 10, 2026
After several false dawns, Dorrian's patience paid off when Clive Nates came on board in 2016 – eventually taking over as chairman in 2018.
From BBC ● Apr. 6, 2026
In some sense, this is akin to the realization that dawns on most people regarding their parents: Before we came along, they had a whole identity that had nothing to do with us.
From Salon ● Feb. 4, 2026
The romantic idea of an insight that suddenly dawns is misleading.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jan. 30, 2026
Slowly it dawns on Helmuth: Fikeis is questioning them as adults.
From "The Boy Who Dared" by Susan Campbell Bartoletti
And it just dawned on me as I'm sitting there looking out at this.
From BBC ● Jul. 7, 2026
When it dawned on the teacher what was happening in broad daylight and in front of other motorists and pedestrians, her initial feeling was of disbelief.
From BBC ● Apr. 29, 2026
But as the EV age dawned, helped by top-down policy such as generous subsidies, Chinese firms hit the throttle.
From Barron's ● Apr. 27, 2026
“It never dawned on me that four years later I’d be like, the murmur is bigger than it ever was,” Glannan said.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Apr. 24, 2026
But it dawned on her that he seemed freaked out dealing with the things that wouldn't smash or smear.
From "Look Both Ways" by Jason Reynolds
Graham Burnett, a history professor at Princeton University, sees "the dawning of an authentic movement," similar to the birth of the environmental movement in the 1960s, which led to landmark environmental protections.
From Barron's ● Apr. 22, 2026
Japan isn’t the only country trying to reshore production of this strategic technology in the dawning age of AI.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Apr. 4, 2026
It’s dawning on both the equity and bond markets that this conflict isn’t looking like a fleeting affair, said Amar Reganti, fixed-income strategist at Hartford Funds.
From MarketWatch ● Mar. 5, 2026
The dawning of reality should be close at hand now for England players - 'maybe it's not you, Scotland, maybe it's us'.
From BBC ● Feb. 14, 2026
It's slowly dawning on me that I'm not the object of everyone's attention.
From "The Sky at Our Feet" by Nadia Hashimi
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
